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HOUSE OF AUSTIN NUNS

39. THE PRIORY OF CRABHOUSE

In 1765 there was presented to the British
Museum an interesting fourteenth-century MS.
Register of Crabhouse Nunnery in French, (fn. 1)
which escaped the attention of monastic and
topographical writers until 1892, when it
received full and competent treatment in
the publication of the Norfolk and Norwich
Archaeological Society. (fn. 2)

From this register and that of Castle Acre, (fn. 3) it
is established that Lena, the daughter of Godric
de Lynne, 'a maiden whose heart the Holy
Spirit moved to seek a desert place where she
might serve God without disturbance of any
earthly thing, found the place called Crabhouse
(in Wiggenhall parish) all wild, and far around
on every side was no human habitation.' This
site was granted about 1181 to the maiden by
Roger, the prior of Ranham and his canons,
with the consent of William de Lesewis, lord of
the site and founder of Normansburgh Priory.
'In this place,' continues the register, 'there
assembled along with Lena other maidens, and
there they caused a chapel to be reared in honour
of God, and of His dear Mother the Virgin
Mary, and of St. John the Evangelist, in which
place for many a day they served God.'

Godfrey de Lesewis (William's son) granted
the cell in Normansburgh to the monks of
Castle Acre, and included amongst its lands the
hermitage of Wiggenhall used by the hermit
Joan. (fn. 4) This hermit Joan is mentioned, though
not by name, in the Crabhouse register, wherein
the overwhelming of the nuns' original habitation by a flood is described, and all save one,
'who made herself a recluse in the cemetery of
Mary Magdalene of Wigenhall,' departed. It is
difficult, however, to reconcile the picturesque
narrative of the French register with the documents of the Castle Acre chartulary, (fn. 5) but it was
definitely established as an Austin nunnery early
in the thirteenth century.

The register contains particulars of a great
variety of small undated bequests made to the
priory in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries,
and similar entries are to be found from time to
time in the patent rolls. Incidental mention is
made of the building of the church, frater,
dorter, and farmery; and there are frequent
references to the conventual mill. Most of its
property was in the same marshy situation as the
actual site of the house, which was on the banks
of the tidal Ouse; the boundaries named are frequently dykes, and it is evident that the priory
took its full share in the draining of the fens. (fn. 6)
There is no record of this house in the taxation
roll of 1291.

Licence was obtained in 1328 by the priory,
at the request of John de Ros, steward of the
household, to appropriate that moiety of the
church of St. Peter, Wiggenhall, which was of
their advowson. (fn. 7) This appropriation was chiefly
brought about, as we learn from the register, by
Robert Welle, a great benefactor of the nuns.
He pardoned them a debt of £100 in return
for a field in Setchey; but he eventually restored
the land to provide the habits of the ten nuns of
the house who had been the longest professed.

Agnes de Methelwold, prioress from 1315
until her death in 1344, seems to have been a
good administrator, as well as a bringer of comparative wealth to the convent. We are told
that she spent over one hundred pounds of silver
in building a hall, a grange, a stable, a bakery,
and a noble room (une chambre nobeles). Under
her rule particular rents were assigned for providing the house with bread, ale, flesh, fish, and
red herrings; others for iron and nails for repairs; and others for dress and shoes, and for
towels and linen. Further sums were set aside
for the repairs of the house and church, the sea
and marsh dykes, the wages of the household
servants, the feeding of the cattle, and for fuel.

Margaret de Hattisle and Cicely de Beauprey,
nuns of Crabhouse, obtained indults in 1352, to
choose confessors for plenary remission at the
hour of death. (fn. 8)

Joan Wiggenhall, a famous prioress, was elected
on 28 October, 1420, and confirmed and installed on 25 November. (fn. 9) In the year of her
election Prioress Joan took down the great barn
by the convent gatehouse, and rebuilt it in time
for the next harvest, at a cost of £45 9s. 6d.,
exclusive of the timber that was felled on their
own lands, and of the tiles that were re-used
from the old barn. To this barn-making Sir
John Inglethorpe, the convent's patron, bequeathed £20, and the archdeacon of Lincoln
gave ten marks. In 1421 Joan extended the
prioress's lodgings at a cost of ten marks,
and spent twenty marks for the rebuilding
of the convent's moiety of the chancel of
St. Peter's, Wiggenhall. In 1422 the prioress
spent twenty marks on the precinct walls,
and forty marks on the cloister. Taking advice in 1423 as to the bad condition of the
conventual church, Joan decided to take it down
and rebuild it: 'Trostynge to the helpe of oure
Lorde and to the grete charite of goode cristen
men.' The one who came chiefly to her assistance in this and other good works was her cousin
Edmund Perys or Pery, rector of Watlington,
who by his will of 1427 desired to be buried in
the conventual church of Crabhouse. The
nuns' new church was over three years in building, and cost 400 marks, 'whereof William
Harold that lithe in the chapel of our Lady
payde for the ledyinge of the chirche vij skore
mark,' Richard Steymour, citizen of Norwich,
paid £40 for the roof, and he also gave them
the stalls and reredos at a cost of £20, and two
antiphoners of the great value of twenty-six
marks, 'whiche lygen in the queer.' Among
other contributions were twenty-one marks from
'the gylde of the Trinite whiche Naybores
helde in this same chirche.' During the time
the work of the church was in progress the
prioress also built 'the longe chaumber on the
este syde of the halle whiche costes xxiiij
mark.'

Edmund Perys, the prioress's chief supporter,
'passed to God on the Wednesday next after
the concepcyon of Oure Lady,' 1427; and
then another good friend came to her help, who
was also her cousin, Dr. John Wiggenhall,
at that time rector of Oxborough. In 1429
he was abbot of West Dereham, and subsequently held many important offices. His father
and mother were buried at Crabhouse. In 1429
he helped the prioress to complete and furnish
the church, setting up the images, paving both
nave and quire, providing stalls and doors for the
quire, and cloths for the altars. The barn at
Wiggenhall St. Peter was repaired in 1430 at
a charge of £5, and a new malt-house rebuilt at
Crabhouse for ten marks. In 1431 the hall or
frater was taken down and built anew at a cost
of seventy marks. That same year the new
malt-house and an old one, with all the malt,
were burnt in a fire caused by a careless woman;
but the prioress, nothing daunted, with the help
of Dr. Wiggenhall and others, set to work, and
in the course of two years built a new malthouse, with a dovecot over the kiln, of better
worth than the two that were burnt, at a cost of
£50. In 1434 Joan repaired and heightened
the bakehouse, raised the steeple and re-roofed
it with lead at a cost of £10, and spent £8 on
rebuilding and slating the north side of the
cloister. In 1435 the dorter (the first set up in
the place) was in such grievous decay that the
prioress, 'dredyinge the perischynge of her sisters
whiche lay thereine,' took it down, but was too
busy in the other works, such as the cart-house,
turf-house and stables, that cost eighty marks, to
do more to it that year. In 1436, 'in the xvij
yere of the same prioress, be the help of God
and of goode cristen men sche began the grounde
of the same dortoure that now standith, and
wrought thereupon fulli vij yere betynes as God
wolde send hir good.' There was a great dearth
of corn in 1438, and Joan must needs have
suspended all further work, if it had not been
for the generosity of Dr. Wiggenhall, who sent
her 100 combs of malt and 200 combs of
barley, in addition to 20 marks, For the soule
of my lord of Exetyr.' £40 and 5 marks were
at the same time provided. The dorter, and
a house at Lynn called Corner Bothe, which
had long been ruinous, were completed in the
winter of 1444. After an energetic rule of
twenty-four years, just when all the work on
which she had been so long engaged was
accomplished, Joan Wiggenhall died, and was
succeeded, early in 1445, by Margaret Dawbeny.

In 1461 Master Stephen Bole, rector of Eccles,
built a good house at the west end of the conventual church of Crabhouse, at a cost of £45,
also in the time of Prioress Margaret; the same
Stephen made other gifts to the convent, particularly in helping with the wall of the porch,
to the extent of £47 10s., and after Etheldreda
Wulmer was appointed prioress in 1469, on the
death of Margaret, Master Stephen continued
his charitable gifts to the priory, particularly in
the making of a new well.

On 9 September, 1476, there was an unusual
ceremony in the nuns' church at Crabhouse,
which was doubtless celebrated in the nave. By
special licence of the bishop of Norwich, Thomas
Hunston and Margaret Keroyle were married in
the monastery. The vicar of St. Mary Magdalene, Wiggenhall, received a composition in lieu
of his fees. (fn. 10)

The convent was visited on 10 July, 1514,
by Master Thomas as commissary for the bishop.
Elizabeth Bredon, the prioress, testified to the
general obedience and religious life of the sisters,
save one, and to the good repair of the buildings.
The house was in debt 10 marks, but was owed
5 marks. Different nuns mentioned the bad
condition of the roof of the Lady Chapel, and the
disobedience and quarrelsome character of others,
and of the in frequency of confession. A painful scandal of the previous year came to light
with respect to one of the sisters. (fn. 11) The bishop
enjoined obedience on the sisters, and on the
prioress the granting greater facilities for confession. Agnes Smyth, the penitent offender,
was ordered to take the lowest seat for a month,
and to say in cloister seven times during that
period the whole psalter.

The visitation of six years later, when Margaret
Studefeld was prioress, was in every way satisfactory; there was nothing to report. (fn. 12)

The Valor of 1535 gave the clear annual
value of the house at £30 6s. 2d. A stipend of
£5 6s. 8d. was paid to the chaplain for officiating
in the church.

In the winter of 1535-6 the religious houses
of Norfolk were exposed to the visitors of Cromwell's appointment, John ap Rice and Dr.
Legh. It is fortunate, so far as this small
nunnery is concerned, that by all the laws of
evidence and of ordinary probability, there is not
the slightest reason to give credence to their
astounding charges. They actually wrote down
that the prioress had given birth to one child,
two of the other nuns had children by single
men, and another two children, one by a priest
and one by a layman! (fn. 13) But on the heels of
these vile informers came the county commissioners, who made a long and thorough inquiry
into the conditions of this house. These gentlemen had.no object whatever in anything but a
truthful report; they did not hesitate to give
credence to scandal in three out of all the many
religious houses of the diocese. Of this priory,
however, they reported of the four religious persons
found there that 'ther name is goode,' and still
more definitely, on the actual deposition of the
prioress they wrote, Bona fama et conversatio.
They reported that there were four women
servants and two hinds that had their living at the
house; that the lead and bells were worth £40 4s.,
and the house in requisite repair; and that the goods
were worth £15 5s. 8d.; and that the house was
not in debt, and had no debts owing to it. (fn. 14)

On the day of the suppression the three nuns
received 26s. 8d. each as 'rewards,' that is, sums
of ready money until pensions were arranged,
Margaret Studefeld, the prioress, had no reward
assigned her. (fn. 15)

The commissioners certified on 16 February,
1537, to the sale to Henry Webbe of all the
goods and chattels of this house, except the plate.
for £9. The plate in Richard Southwell's keeping was valued at 115s.

11. This is absolutely the one solitary instance of immorality which comes before us in all these visitations
of the Norfolk (Norwich diocese) nunneries, which
cover a period of just forty years; Dr. Jessopp's Introd.
to Norw. Visit. xlii.